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====Ancient Nubian Culture====
[[File: Nubia.png|300px|thumbnail|left|Map of Egypt and Nubia: the The Numbers Represent the Cataracts of the Nile River]]
[[File: First Cataract.jpg|300px|thumbnail|right|The Edge of the First Cataract Near Modern Aswan/Ancient Abu]]
The term “Nubia” is actually a modern word, which may be derived from the ancient Egyptian word for gold – <i>nebu</i>. To both the Egyptians and Nubians, the Nile River was the source of their lifeblood as it brought yearly floods that allowed their crops to grow, so both peoples were geographical orientated along a north-south axis. The Egyptians referred to anything south of the first cataract (cataracts are rocky portions of a river unnavigable by boat) as “Wawat” and anything south of the second cataract was called “Kush.” Collectively, Wawat and Kush comprise the region that modern scholars generally refer to as Nubia. <ref> Morkot, Robert. <i>The Black Pharaohs: Egypt’s Nubian Rulers.</i> (London: Rubicon Press, 2000), p. 6</ref>